Recipe: Grandma’s Cranberry Apricot Chutney

Had a moment of panic that I lost this recipe this morning, but it was just hiding behind some other things on the fridge. Thought I’d post it up just in case I ever do misplace it!

This goes really well on bread with a little cream cheese (makes an excellent tea sandwich!), or as a spread for crackers, or even on pork or something (though I’ve never tried it that way).

You’ll need:
1 1/4 cups of sugar
1/2 cup water
1 bag cranberries
3/4 cup snipped dried apricots
3 tbs. brown sugar
3 tbs. cider vinegar
1 tbs. minced ginger

Heat the water and sugar until the sugar melts. Bring it to a boil. Add everything else and summer until it’s thickened. Cool and serve (I like it cooled, but I suppose you could try it warm as well).

No Rats Included

This comes from the 2005-2006 edition of “Secrets from the Kitchen.” Potentially part of a book of food writing (a memoir of sorts).

When my cousins and I get together, it is always a grand affiar. We see each other a lot, and every time we get together we pick up just where we left off the last time we saw each other. We love to make crazy home movies in which we create our own television shows or funny movies. For the longest time, we filmed an advertisement video for a horrible camp called Camp Hymelick, where they fed the campers onion soup and slices of Ched-O-Bit cheese everyday.

One of the other things we like to do together is cook. Whenever we get into the kitchen we always create something – whether it be a great new food or a horrible mess that we leave behind for someone else to clearn up. We have attempted to make all kinds of things, from pizza to fondue. Most of our creations involve cheese in mass amounts, which we eat without a care in the world and regret it later when we’re all sick to our stomachs from too much cheese.

Another one of the the things we specialize in is dessert. For the most part, I make the dough and my cousins and sister help me cook by eating it as I am going along. Still, this balance works and we soon find that we have a niec batch of cookies to enjoy. A few summers ago (the night we made pizza with tons of cheese), I decided to try an easy looking recupe that I happened to have all the ingredients for. It was for Lime Cookies, and they quickly became one of my cousin Kara’s favorites.

When Kara was visiting me last year [note: this was written in 2005, so by "last year" I mean 2004], she beged me to make her the lime cookies. So around eight o’clock that night we had to go to the supermarket to pick up the ingredients. When we got home, we set to work. However, the lime cookie dough needs to be refrigerated for one hour before the cookies can be baked. Neither of us wanted to wait that long to enjoy something sweet. I suggested that we make my grandmother’s macaroons while we waited for the dough to cool, since they were quick and easy to do. Kara agreed.

We assembled all the ingredients in a big bowl and prepared to add the flour when I spotted a container of cocoa powder in the cabinet. Knowin you could replace flour with cocoa powder in a cake, I figured the same thing would be true in the macaroons. Feeling adventurous, we decided to give it a try. The result: an improvement to an already wonderful recipe.

When we got the end of the batter, we decided (as we often do) to make one giant cookie. We shaped the dough into an oval and placed it into the oven to cook. When it was ready, we left it on the counter to cool and enjoyed the smaller cookies that were already finished. Eventually we were able to cook the lime cookies as well and we forgot about the giant cookie in the kitchen.

When my mother came home that evening, she walked into the kitchen and gasped. My cousin and I looked up from where we were sitting to see what had scared her. It turns out that she had looked at the giant chocolate-and-coconut cookie mound on the counter and thought it was a giant rat! From that day on, Kara and I renamed our created “Rat Cookies.’

Try them and see if you like them as much as Kara and I do. And I promise – there are no rats included.

Rat Cookies
A.K.A. Chocolate Coconut Macaroon

Ingredients
2 large egg whites
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 tsp vanilla
2 1/2 cups coconut
2 tbs. unsweetened cocoa poweder

Directions
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees
2. Mix the egg whites until soft peaks form.
3. Add the sugar and mix well.
4. Add the vanilla and cocoa powder and mix until glossy and stiff.
5. Stir in the coconut.
6. Let the mixture stand for 10 minutes.
7. Line baking sheets with aluminum foil.
8. Place the macaroons on the foil, keeping them two inches apart.
9. Bake until the tops are browned, about 13 minutes.
10. Rest in the pan for 2 minutes.
11. Cool completely on foil on a wire rack.

If you would like to make the original version, you will need to use 2 tbs. of flour instead of the cocoa powder, and then melt 3 1/2 oz. of bittersweet chocolate. When the macaroons are cool, dip the tops in the chocolate and allow them to set. The chocolate should be hardened before the macaroons are ready to eac (but I won’t tell anyone if you eat them while the chocolate is till melted!).

Recipe: Grandma’s Cheesecake

Here’s the famous Roberts family cheesecake recipe. With it I posted the story I wrote about it for “Secrets from the Kitchen,” the recipe/story project I do with my students. This is all part of the new series on the family website called “Cooking Tales.”

Passing the Torch

“No one who cooks, cooks alone. Even at her most solitary, a cook in the kitchen is surrounded by generations of cooks past, the advice and menus of cooks present, the wisdom of cookbook authors.”

-Laurie Colwin

When I was a little girl, I used to stand in the kitchen on one of the wrought iron chairs, pulled up to the counter so that I could see what my grandmother was cooking. I would study her movements intently, watching as each ingredient became a part of what would be the finished product. Often I would be her helper, cracking eggs or stirring a pot on the stove. It was always amazing to me hwo she could make just about anything I asked for, even if it was just shaved ice from the ancient freezer (with a small amount of soda poured on top – the original Slurpee, I suppose!).

As I got older, my love of cooking grew as I continued to learn from my grandma. Whenever I would visit her I would learn something new, from mustard chicken to chocolate mousse (my personal favorite!). Now, I love being the cook myself, the person everyone goes to when they are looking for a good meal. However, I still enjoy watching my grandma cook just as much as I enjoy making my own recipes. Though I have had years of practice with my own recipes and cookbooks, I still think that everything I know about cooking I learned from her.

In my family, my grandmother is famous for her cheesecake. The recipe was found years ago in an article. Though the magazine that published the article is long forgotten, the recipe is alive and well and inevitably makes its way to every family function that we have. For years my grandma would be the one to make it for every party or holiday gathering we had. One year, however, when my family threw a baby shower for my aunt, the cheesecake became my duty. The recipe was handed to me on an index card, and I tried it for the first time in my life. It was a success, and the torch was passed! From that day on, it has been my job to make the cheesecake.

Grandma’s Cheesecake
In order to make this cheesecake, you will need:

24 oz. cream cheese (3 bars – Philadelphia works best)
5 eggs
1 cup sugar
1/4 tsp almond extract
butter, to grease the pan

First, beat the cream cheese until it is softened. Then add the eggs, sugar and almond extract into the bowl. Beat all the ingredients together until smooth, thick and lemon-colored. Pour into a buttered 9″ springform cake pan. Bake the cake in a moderate oven (about 325 degrees) for 45-50 minutes, or until set (the middle should not jiggle when you give the pan a shake!).

Remove the cake from the oven and allow it to sit. Don’t panic when the cake collapses – it’s supposed to do that! Once the cake is cooled, remove it form the pan and pour the glaze over the top (see the glaze recipe below).

Glaze
To make the cheesecake glaze, you will need”

1 4-oz. bar of German baker’s chocolate
1 tbs butter
3 tbs water
1 cup confectioner’s sugar
dash salt
1/2 tsp vanilla

First melt the chocolate, butter and water in a small saucepan. Once these ingredients have become a liquid, turn off the stove and add the confectioner’s sugar, salt and vanilla. Stir all the ingredients together until smooth. If the sugar is too climpy and not blending well with the chocolate, you can put the pan back on the stove over low hear for a few minutes. Once the glaze is smooth, pour it over the cheesecake, allowing the glaze to drip down the sides.

You can try a variety of different things with your cheesecake. You can top it with fresh fruit or you can add chocolate chips into the batter! Experiment with it and make it your own.

Recipe: Brownies

These are the best brownies ever! The cooking time depends completely on your preferred texture. We like severely undercooked around here!

2 sticks unsalted butter
4 oz unsweetened chocolate, chopped
2 cups sugar
4 eggs
1 tsp vanilla
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup flour

Grease a 13x9x12 pan. Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

In a large pot, heat butter. When half melted remove from heat. Stir in sugar with a wooden spoon. Add eggs one at a time. Stir until chocolate is shiny. Stir in vanille. Add flour and salt. Spread in pan. Bake 30 minutes (less time for fudgier brownies, more time for “cakier” brownies). Cool completely in pan.

A fun “fact:” These brownies are officially called “Pot” Brownies because you pretty much prepare them all in one pot!